adam

I honestly don't know as 9-8 with a first-round playoff loss would be the definition of mediocrity from 2019-2021. A losing record and two playoff losses. At some point you need more. Also, we have to start evaluating whether the team is getting beat because they are better coached/scheme (On Nagy) or if the other team has better players (on Pace), or both.

Oh I know, just interesting timing I guess.

Hicks has a groin issue. I would just keep him out until after the bye. He keeps reaggravating it.

All of a sudden, coming out on Twitter to expose the Packers, wow, where was this last week when we needed it.

Damn, Hicks is downgraded to out. However, Williams was activated off the C19 list, so he can play.

So I totally forgot about the 3rd WC slot (the same one the Bears slipped into last year). The difference this year is the 17th game. The extra game for the Bears was LVR, for the Vikings, it's the LAC. That extra game may end up being the difference in making the playoffs or not this year. At this point, if the Bears can survive to the bye, with TB, SF at home, and PIT (MNF) in the next 3, they have a much more favorable schedule down the stretch. They have to win one, but two puts their odds of making the playoffs very high. If you consider TB a loss (3-4), then SF a win (at home) - SF plays SNF against IND at home. With a loss against the Colts, they could come into Chicago at 2-4 and 4 straight losses. Then in Week 8, the Bears go to Pittsburgh with an extra day to prepare. Pittsburgh is in Cleveland in Week 7. So Pittsburgh doesn't gain additional time between games. A win to go 5-4 into the bye would be huge. Even a loss is not the end of the world. The Wild Card is going to come down to the following teams vying for the 2nd and 3rd slot. If you lock LAR or ARZ into WC1 (whoever loses the division), then you have 6 teams for 2 spots. 3 from the NFC South, which normally works itself out once they play each other. WC2 - NO 3-2, still has 2x games against TB, and plays TEN, BUF, DAL, all probable losses. So if they win every other game, they are 10-7. Hard not to see them slip up once in those other 7 games to finish 9-8. That is the best-case scenario. Still 2x vs ATL and one vs CAR. WC2 probably finishes 9-8. Week 17 vs CAR. Week 18 @ ATL. WC3 - MIN 3-3, plays DAL, BAL, LAC, GB in their next 4 games (talk about brutal). They can easily lose all 4 and be 3-7 going to SF. Just say they win 1 (unlikely), that's 4-6, then they play the Bears twice, LAR and GB again. Let's say they split with the Bears and lose to both the Rams and Packers, that is 5-9 (at best), and they win their other 3 against PIT, DET, and SF, that is a tough 8-9. They have to split with the Bears AND beat one of DAL, BAL, LAC, GB, AND beat PIT to get to 8 wins. The only way they get to 9, by sweeping the Bears and still beating someone like DAL and PIT. Possible, but unlikely. I say they finish between 7-10 or 8-9. ------------------ 4 - CHI 3-3, the Bears lose to TB and PIT, beat SF, and are now 4-5 into the bye; then 4 wins against DET, MIN, SEA, and NYG and losses against BAL, ARZ, GB, and MIN makes them 8-9. They will need to beat PIT or sweep against MIN to slip into WC3 at 9-8. Beating PIT AND sweeping MIN would put them at 10-7, which seems like the ultimate ceiling. There is an extremely high probability that Week 18 in Minnesota is a playoff play-in game, win and you're in. They both could come into Week 18 both at 8-8. I just can't see MIN beating DAL, PIT and sweeping the Bears (4-0), then the Bears obviously losing 2 to MIN and losing to PIT (0-3). That's basically what would need to happen for MIN to beat CHI into the playoffs. I think the Bears finish 9-8 and none of that matters. 5 - CAR 3-3, hasn't played TB yet, 0-2, still have to play BUF and ARZ. At least 4 losses there. Depending on who wins CAR vs NO may decide which one of those teams gets into the playoffs. Playing out their schedule, they go either 8-9 or 9-8 as well. Their season may come down to beating ATL once or twice. Week 17 @ NO, Week 18 @ TB. 6 - SF 2-3, they still have ARZ, LAR x2, CIN, TEN, CHI and MIN. I have them finishing no better than 7-10 and at best 8-9. I have them losing to the Bears, beating IND this week. That is 3-4, then ARZ, LAR to 3-6. Then JAX, MIN, SEA (2-1) to 5-7. Then CIN, ATL, TEN, HOU (2-2) to 7-9. Week 18 @ LAR. They would have to beat MIN, SEA, and CIN or CHI to get to 9 wins. Odds are they split and go 8-9. 7 - ATL 2-3, they truly are the wild card team in all of this. They have 2x against both NO and CAR, and one against SF. They probably have 3 losses against TB, DAL, and BUF, but depending on how they are viewed otherwise, if they beat MIA, JAX, and DET, and go 2-3 in their remaining 5 games, they go 7-10. Those 2 wins would be against one of NO, CAR, or SF, which would change the outcomes of those teams. Week 18 vs NO. BLUF: 9-8 should make the playoffs, Week 18 may decide it. Go Bears!

Since the Cleveland debacle, Fields has had a QBR of 76.8 (DET), 29.0 (vs LVR), and 40.5 (vs GB). That also counts the ridiculous INT on the no delay game call. Compared to the other rookies, Jones has been the most consistent with the highest floor (which was somewhat expected). Lawrence had the best game of his career in Week 4 QBR-wise, but in that game, he was just 17-24 for 204 yards, 0 TD, 0 INT and had a rushing TD. Week 4-6: Lawrence 82.5, 28.8, 52.7, one great game, one bad game, one average game. Wilson 40.8, 17.3, Bye, one average game, one terrible game Jones 46.9, 65.4, 46.4, two average games, one good game I feel like Jones is playing exactly how he was projected.

Add LB Lavonte David to that list of players out. No Richard Sherman either. So the Bears are going to have opportunities in the passing game. Would love for a breakout game from Fields here.

Oh yeah, not at the time. The mistake was letting Amos go the offseason before. That predicated this signing. They almost had no choice. Clinton-Dix was way worse than expected, and you couldn't go into the next season needing both safeties. However, the right move would've been signing Amos, then getting a comp pick for Jackson, but no way was that ever going to happen.

Lol. Someone on Twitter said that he is not making plays because the other teams are avoiding him, which is comically false. The same guy said that Safeties are not paid to tackle, another chucklefest. The first thing Safeties need to do is tackle, then the playmakers either get INTs and PDs, or Sacks and TFLs, depending where they line up. Jackson has literally done none of those since 2018.

I was in favor of an extension as well, assumed it was a no brainer, but looking back deeper into the game logs, I was surprised to see his "real" production was only over a 7 week period, which was unsustainable anyway. However, that made his season and career stats to that point look so much better. Also, this is not just a one-year drop-off. This is year 3 into the Mariana Trench.

Jackson has a cap hit of $5M this year, which balloons to $15M in 2022, and would be a dead cap of $18.5M as a cut or $8.9M as a post-June 1 cut ($6.1M in savings). In 2023, he has a cap hit of $17M and dead cap of $9.5M. So there are some options. The Bears could go the post-June 1 cut route in 2022, then save the $6.1M for in-season moves or allow it to roll over into 2023. That way he is off the roster as soon as possible with minimal impact on the cap. If they keep him, then he eats up $15M next year and a roster spot, which seems worse to me. I would rather eat $8.9M and have a roster spot for an actual player while saving $6.1M for in-season or rollover dollars. I doubt anyone trades for that albatross of a contract. Most guys making league minimum at Safety are outperforming Jackson. So I was looking back at his stats and at first I thought the clear cliff drop-off occurred after his injury and it did. However, there was one small stretch that really earned him that big paycheck. So his career really has 3 periods: The Young Starter, from his rookie year, until the middle of his second season. He played in 23 games over this period, and was playing as a solid starter, but nothing too special. 2017 > Week 7, 2018 23 games 10 PD 4 INT 2 TD Then he went All-Pro Tecmo Bowl mode, like a stretch of games only future HoFers have. Check out his next 7 games, which ended with that Rodgers INT and injury: Weeks 8-14, 2018 7 games 11 PD 5 INT 3 TD Now the drop-off. The Practice Squad Fodder period. The crazy part is Pace paid him AFTER 2019, which was after 16 games of this crap: 2019 > Current 38 games 10 PD 2 INT (Off of Blough and Mannion both end of game Hail Mary/bombs) 1 TD So he had more passes defended in a 7 game window in 2018 than he has had in his last 38 games, 38! He had 5 INTs in 7 games and only has 2 in his last 38. He doesn't have a single PD this year and only 10 in his last 38 games. It is absolutely insane the cliff this guy fell off performance-wise. I don't blame Pace fully as they were hoping for more of that 7 game stretch, but his pay jumped up way too high after an average 2019. He still owns the 5th biggest Safety contract behind only Adams, Smith, Simmons, and Baker. At most, they should've signed him to a top 10 slot, not top 5.

Line is down to +12. Antonio Brown, who was going to be the toughest matchup for the secondary is out. So is Gronk. So the defense now only has to worry about Evans/Godwin and Fournette. That is a much better matchup for the Bears defense. The Bucs will start Dee Delaney and Jamel Dean at CB. Our WRs have to get open against these no-name guys.

I agree on Burrow. I was shocked at how weak his arm was. To throw down the field, he literally has to throw a moon shot. He is going to settle into the game manager role and you are correct, he is very similar to Dalton.

Would anyone be opposed to elevating Desai to HC? This guy is just so much more credible than Nagy or even Pace. The consensus is the players like him and based on his comments, he holds guys accountable.

TB beat PHI 28-22 and NE 19-17. So I figure we are close to those teams. They played Hurts and Jones. Fields is better. The Bears defense is better than PHI's and NE's, so we should at least hold them to something in the 20s. It is going to come down to the Bears offense vs Bucs defense.

Pretty funny how everyone but the Bears organization knows how to unlock the offense. Most of us have been saying we can't be so predictable and rush on every 1st down, need to pass more with the run protection look (12 personnel) and give Fields some scripted run plays:

What is crazy is Jones has 3x the number of completions than Fields already. Jones lowest attempts was 21 last week, before that he never had fewer than 30 attempts. Fields on the other hand had his high of 27 attempts last week and that was the first time he had over 21 attempts. The contrast is wild. NE is handling Jones perfectly, giving him easy completions and getting the ball of out his hands quickly. He has only been sacked 13 times compared to 18 for Fields in half as many attempts. The good thing is Fields is improving, his DVOA has risen up from that historic low now to -51.5%. Still a long way to go to a respectful level, but now he is within range of the other rookies (Wilson -50.8%, Mills -34.3%, Lawrence -22.4%, Jones -12.3%). There is so many variables to QB play, Jets moved on from Darnold only to see Wilson play worse. Then the Panthers moved on from Bridgewater only to see Darnold play worse. LOL. Same for Philly. They went with Hurts over Wentz, and Wentz has been better. Cleveland is probably going to find out that Keenum is better than Mayfield too here really quick.

I really hope Quinn doesn't miss the game. He needs two negative tests to play. If that was from Tuesday, there is a chance he can play on Sunday. Odd that Williams is still out, I assume that means he was not vaccinated. Herbert has looked great, but

I will have to watch the game again to see if I can pick up on that. Interesting that they don't show him that much lately. Back to the Dillon spot. In this video, watch the side judge take a side step to his right. Not only did he side step further than Dillon got, he was still short of the sticks and they marked the ball another yard down field. WTH.

By the way, did anyone else notice Nagy having his card back in front of his face. I will have to watch the game again, but some said he didn't have it in the first quarter, then was seen with it in the 2nd and 3rd quarters (when everything stalled), and didn't have it again in the 4th. The 2x TD drives were in the 1st and 4th. Check this out: If that is the case, Nagy should be fired.

Watch Eddie Jackson on that play. What a joke, untouched, just jogging to the ball carrier in the end zone. Pitiful.

This is a tale of polar opposites. The #1 Passing team in the league (TB) vs the 32nd Passing team in the league (CHI). TB is also the #1 rushing defense. So it is: TB Passing #1 vs CHI Pass Def #8, TB Rushing #28 vs CHI Rush Def #16 CHI Passing #32 vs TB Pass Def #27, CHI Rushing #7 vs TB Rush Def #1 So in a way, it is strength vs strength and weakness vs weakness. Bears lead the league in sacks with 21. TB only has 12. TB has 7 INTs, the Bears have 4 (thanks Jackson). TB has beaten ATL, NE, MIA, and PHI, and lost to LAR. So they really haven't beaten a team with more than 2 wins. In contrast, the Bears have beaten CIN and LVR, both at 4-2 and lost to CLE (3-3), GB (5-1) and LAR (5-1). TB has the easiest schedule in the NFL, shocking for a Super Bowl Champion. They only one team left on their schedule that currently has 4 or more wins (BUF in Week 14). They theoretically can go 16-1 or 15-2 based on being favored in every remaining game. The Bears may be the toughest defense they face all year. This is a huge spread and opened at 13.5. The Bears should lose this game, but I don't think it will be by 2 TDs. I am projecting a better output by the offense, but TB is too explosive on offense to keep up. I think it will be very similar to the Philly game for TB. TB 28-23 CHI, Bears score late to make it close.

Oh I know, he barely threw the ball that year. So 7 INTs was a lot compared to the number of attempts, and if you remember, he had a ton of near INTs. I was just pointing out that Fields is a lot further along than Mitch was, especially in that department. Another comp is Lamar Jackson. He started 7 games as a rookie. His highest passing total for one game was 204 yards. He ranged from 125 yards passing to 204 in those 7 games. That was with a comp% in the mid 50's. He threw 5 TDs and 3 INTs, and also had a ton of rushing yards. In 6 of those 7 games he had more rushes than completions. Josh Allen also had an interesting rookie year. He only had 1 game over 225 yards (245) in 11 starts. He had 10 TD and 12 INTs. Go look back at Allen against GB in Week 4 2018. A 22-0 loss. Allen had 151 yards passing and 2 INTs, was sacked 7 times and had a 48% completion percentage. In his first 6 starts, he topped 200 yards once. Both Jackson and Allen are now MVP candidates. So I think Fields is on track. This is going to be a growth year with some ups and downs but he is trending in the right direction.

Another name to consider is Doug Pederson. He won a Super Bowl with Nick Foles, and has a 4-2 playoff record. His teams are rarely bad, both sides of the ball were constantly in the top half of the league and he is pretty innovative in how he uses his players. Something Nagy used in 2018 with the different player packages. We haven't seen that since.